Color Me Confused
by the.goal.is.greatness
Summary: Great is language... it is the mightiest of sciences. [Kirk x Spock, offside Sulu x Chekov] [rated for language]


**Title:** Color Me Confused  
**Genre:** Romance / Humor  
**Rating:** M [language]  
**Pairing:** Kirk x Spock [Sulu x Chekov]  
**Spoilers:** N/A  
**Summary:** Great is the language… it is the mightiest of sciences.  
**Word Count:** 2,771  
**Warnings:** N/A

**Disclaimer:** _Star Trek_ does not belong to me. Summary is a quote from _Leaves of Grass_ by Walt Whitman.

**A/N:** Prompt I saw on Tumblr.

* * *

"Kirk to Uhura. Report."

There's a crackle of static from the other end of the line that worries him. Sending the best Science Officer and the best Communications officer the Fleet has down to a hostile planet that was surrounded by an iffy layer of swirling cosmic dust was not on his To Do list this morning, but well, that was Starfleet for you. Always making people do things they didn't want to. Always making Captains send their dorky, scientist First Officers into certain danger. Always making them a hot mess of worry and anxiety and –

"Captain." Uhura's voice is music to his ears. "There's… problems… translators…" There's so much static he can only make out one out of every few words. "Need… up… repair…"

He _thinks_ there's a problem with the translators. How strange. Well, whatever, if they needed to come back up here to tweak that stupid contraption then at least it gave him a chance to give them a once over and make sure they were okay. And to force his way into the next landing party group. Spock's logic about the captain and the first officer being on the same party be damned. "Copy that, Lieutenant. I'll see you in the Transporter room in two minutes." He stands, stretching the kinks out of his spine. "Sulu, you have the con," he said as he departs.

There's nothing in his walk from the captain's chair to the turbo lift, or from the turbo life and down the hall to imply that he is worried. He is calm and easy now that he knows they are coming back with seemingly no complications. Uhura didn't mention any injuries, so he knows that they are okay. It isn't until a shuddering blast of… _something_… rockets down the hallway, something that he can feel but cannot see, something that shudders the entire hull of his ship and sends him to his knees, that he starts to worry just a smidge.

But still, it _could_ just be Scotty attempting to achieve Warp 11 or blast them into another dimension. You never know.

Staggering to his feet, he pressed a hand to his communicator. "Sulu, report. What the fuck?"

There's a blip of static. "Taicho? Gomen nasai – eto…"

Another sure of static cuts off the rest of that jibberish. Jim blinks. The fuck? This is either an elaborate prank, they've run across that idiot Q again, or this was Not Good. The level of his worry ups another notch until it's teetering on Full Blown Panic. He rushes down the last few feet to barrel into the transporter room, watching a wide-eyed Uhura be helped to her feet by his XO.

"Spock!" The relief in his voice is palpable. Whole and in one piece. And Uhura, too, he guessed. "Lieutenant! What happened?"

Two blank stares. "Khart-lan?" Spock's voice is quieter than Jim as ever heard it. He seems… confused, for the first time in his tenure here on the Enterprise. Kirk feels his heart fall into his stomach. Oh no, no, no, no… "Nash-veh ri tor… ken tor…"

Most definitely Not Good then.

* * *

"But Bones, what the fuck happened?!" He's not bothering to contain his anxiety, which has bypassed Alarmed and shot straight off the charts into Terrified territory. His hands have been shaking since he and Spock parted ways. Uhuru had looked like she was planning on determinedly going to force someone to understand her. But Spock had looked… lost as he listened to Jim babble with no understanding of what he was saying.

"You think I know, kiddo? I'm a doctor, not an engineer!"

When Jim staggered into Med Bay he was almost in tears. Thankfully Bones was as crabby and bitter and as _English speaking_ as ever, though he seemed incredibly irate that M'Benga had suddenly lapsed back into Vulcan and three of his best nurses were speaking nothing but Tagalog. "But… but what do I _do_?" Besides the fact that he couldn't tell his helmsman where to go, or his Communications officer who to hail, or his engineer what to build to try and fix this… he couldn't talk to _Spock. _Spock who was, besides being the smartest person in all of fucking Starfleet and probably the only one who could figure this shit out, he was also the yin to Kirk's yang, the person who shot down his crazy ideas, who calmed him down with a few simple words, who was his rock. How the hell was he supposed to do this without him?

Bones shrugged, turning most of his attention back to the struggling yeoman who was muttering at him in Spanish while he tried to perform a physical. "Dunno. It's not my fault that almost all your senior officers suddenly don't speak a lick of sense. Maybe Spock –"

"Is speaking only Vulcan if you hadn't fucking noticed." His voice cracks on the last word.

"- can pick up a few words with that genius green brain of his," he continued as if Jim hadn't spoken. "Or Uhura could."

Jim sniffed, belligerent. "I can learn stuff quick, too."

"Yeah, whatever, kid, you're a model for proper Standard language rules. Now get out and let me get back to work." He jabs a hypo in the neck of the terrified woman and she slumps unconscious to the table with a thud. McCoy surveys his work with a level of glee that Kirk finds a tad disturbing and he uses the moment to slink away before the hypo-happy doctor can set his sights on him.

* * *

Three days go by like that. _Three days_. And it's a nightmare of a time because the entirety of command except for Bones and Kirk can't speak two fucking words to each other.

"Chekov – "

"YA do sikh por ne mogu ponyat' vas, ser."

"Oh yeah, I forgot, um – "

"Kapteni, labda tunapaswa kuitikisa Shiriksho?"

"Uhura, literally the only thing I understood was 'captain' so I know you're talking to me but like, I don't know, whatever you want, girl." She stares at him with a look that's just a tad shy of insubordination so she probably understood the tone, if not the words. He makes a dismissive waving gesture with his hands, hoping whatever she said wasn't 'captain, maybe we should mutiny and see if that helps, you ass' and he'd just given her permission to do it.

"Khart-lan." He turns when Spock's voice appears at his elbow.

"Yo, Commander. This is weird isn't it?" He laughs. "I feel like I'm talking to my fucking self all the time." Spock's eyes show no light of understanding, they're darting across his face as if trying to figure out a way to force himself to understand through some weird Vulcan mind power. Kirk shrugs. "Oh well."

"Khart-lan… ashal-veh…"

It's making Jim uncomfortable to stare into those pools of liquid brown that are Spock's eyes right now. He feels like Spock is trying to tell him something important, but it's just out of grasp. "Spock –"

"Taicho! Chikyu kara no ail!"

"Sulu! I have no idea what that fucking means!" His helmsman turns to him with a dead-eyed stare that says he doesn't have once second to spare for his Captain's sarcastic as shit tone. "This is ridiculous. Can someone get Riley up here? And someone find a dictionary for the Bridge, for fuck's sake."

Nothing. Just a sea of blank faces.

"Whatever, I'll do it myself."

* * *

Another day passes where Kirk is pulling his hair out of his fucking head. He can't function without Spock, that's become abundantly clear, and whatever tinkering and research Spock is doing to figure this out, Kirk just has to hope will work itself out, because when Spock tried to explain it to him, it gave him a headache and he only understand precisely zero of it. So much for telling Bones he'd start studying his Beginners Guide to Vulcan.

Uhura keeps hailing every ship and planet in all of Federation space trying to find a single other person who speaks Swahili and her lack of success has made her increasingly butthurt. Half of what she spits at him these days sounds like curses (whether just general 'fuck you' curses or all out 'and your children's children will feel my wrath' curses he can't tell) and he doesn't want to piss her off anymore by trying to pantomime tasks to her with shitty sign language.

Scotty is… Kirk doesn't want to know what Scotty is doing. "Caiptean! Chan eil fios agam de a tha a 'dol ach tha mi a' smaoineachadh gun do rinn mi a-mach Warp aon-deug!" Bless you. There's an explosion from behind him and all Kirk had understood was that Gaelic has no word for Warp and he hoped that the last word wasn't like, fifteen, and you know what, Scotty could do whatever he wanted, Kirk had bigger problems to deal with.

The only Bridge crew who seemed unperturbed by the entire situation were Chekov and Sulu who kept making doe eyes at one another and muttering things that no one understood but _sounded_ like they were R-rated love sonnets in each of their respective languages. It was nauseating.

But Kirk wasn't the youngest Captain in the Fleet for nothing. He could still use a computer, at least they were still all in Standard. And wasn't he the man who had beaten the Kobiyashi Maru? Okay, so _maybe_ it was cheating, but Kirk preferred to think of it as Alternate Reasoning. So thanks to his genius brain, he was about to pull an All Nighter like that time he partied for three days straight instead of studying for his Tactical Maneuvering final and then aced the exam like a boss. He had a dinner date with _Vulcan for Dummies_ and he was definitely getting laid.

* * *

"Spock it's me," Kirk says, as he types in his Captain's over ride and steps into the Vulcan's quarters twelve exhaustive hours later. He's only awake right now due to a combination of Adderall, Whiskey, and the sheer high of Doing Something Right so this might be a short conversation. "So hey, I did some studying and – "

"Khart-lan nash-veh lau u' muhl is-tor nash pavesh – "

"Hey yo, Spock, wait a minute – "

" – tor var-tor-du – "

"Um – " His mind is scrambling trying to translate things this fast and it's partially working.

"- uf mau nash-veh svi' ashaya k' du."

Kirk blinked and felt a telltale heat creep across his cheeks in what he knew was an unbecoming flush. "Oh man, fuck – "

Spock takes a step forward, eyes very earnest and trying to look like he's not spilling his green guts all over the cabin floor to someone who Can't Understand Him (but totally can). "Nash-veh ashaya du. Du nam-tor t'nash-veh – "

"Spock, bro – "

"- t'hy'la." He finishes his speech with a triumphant nod of his chin, staring at Kirk like he'd just explained to him the laws of thermodynamics or some shit and not utilized a crappy translator malfunction to become the Mr. fucking Darcy of the Enterprise bro-squad. Though it wasn't quite the heartfelt admission Kirk had been looking for, at least Spock could admit their undying friendship goals in the wake of this catastrophe.

"Uh, yeah, ni nem-tor wuh…" Shit how do you say _studied_? "… tevul rivak?" Crash course? That'll work. "svi' Vuhlkansu…" With every work Spock's face had grown paler and paler until Jim was honestly afraid he'd have to catch his First Officer in a swoon. And wouldn't that be _amazing_. But he'd forgotten how to say any semblance of apology, so he settled for looking sheepish and remorseful, but the telltale heat of a blush still scrawled across his cheeks probably wasn't helping.

* * *

No, no, no, no, no. This could not be happening to him. He took a step backwards, trying for distance, trying to steady his racing pulse and breath. Trying not to stare into Jim's blue, blue eyes and see the disgust there.

"Spock?"

The sympathy in his captain's voice was too much, he couldn't stand to hear it, to hear what he was sure was going to be a denial, a dismissal. A 'no thank you I don't see you that way.'

"Spock I … don't really understand… everything you said… but I think…" Jim's face is a mask of concentration as he attempts to recall words he crammed into his head the night before. Spock had been too busy trying to solve this language barrier problem to even think about taking a – a – _crash course_ in Standard. But of course Jim had. "You love me…" Maybe another pulse would strike the ship and _kill_ him. " – like a… brother?"

Spock blinked. Was it just his imagination or did Kirk look a little crestfallen, a little kicked-puppy, at that mistranslated word, that he can hear by the inflection is not being said in the same way Spock had said it. "T'hy'la?"

Kirk nods and repeats the word, but Spock can tell by how he says it that he does not mean it like Spock means it, he means it in the simplest terms. The most basic and easiest translation. But that is not what Spock wants. He is in too deep. And besides, hadn't Kirk already heard him say all manner of other things that he supposedly understood. That he loved Kirk. Though Kirk seemed to think he meant like a brother and if Spock was wrong about the disappointment he heard so faintly in that voice he was about one sentence away from formally requesting to serve on another ship.

"No… t'hy'la is… katra?"

"Soul?"

"Tel."

Kirk concentrates. "Bond." Spock nods. "Soul… bond…" He repeats the words in Standard, then his eyes widen and he says something else in Standard that almost sounds the same, but that Spock doesn't understand. "T'hy'la," he breathes and it is _soulmate_ when he says it.

Spock's eyes soften. "Yes. Soulmate. Mine own soulmate." He takes a step forward, then another and another until he's staring down at Kirk's wide, disbelieving eyes. When he swings his hand forward just slightly, their fingertips brush together in the softest touch and the connection is electric. It is beyond words or language. It is _yesfriendcomradewantmore_. It is _lovelovelove_ and Spock leans forward with a sigh at the bright, golden light of it. Kirk's mind slides over his like a blanket and sinks against his. _wantloveyearning_ There is a tremble in Jim's fingers and in his hitching breath. _Yesadorationlovelovelove_

"T'hy'la…" Spock breaths the word against Jim's lips and when they sigh against him, there is nothing more natural in the world than leaning down and pressing them together. The contact is lightning and thunder and rainstorms and _everything_. It is like coming home. It is fate. It is destiny.

Jim is smiling against his mouth, a gentle curve of lip that is both divine and distracting, a tease and a temptation to see what else Spock can do to elicit that response. "T'hy'la," he murmurs against him. The very word is a promise.

He knows that he should explain to his Captain that he solved the translator malfunction, the he knows the proper frequency to use to make everything return to normal with a single blast of concentrated ionized particles. He knows it is important. That Uhura will probably throttle the next person who tries to say, 'honey are you okay' in a soothing psychiatrist tone, that Scotty is probably one Scotch away from Warp 12 and killing them all. He knows there are approximately four dozen crew that would love to be able to converse with their fellow passengers.

But right now, Jim Kirk is arching against him like a cat, so Spock finds he doesn't really care about any of that. All he cares about is this moment, where language is no barrier, and the only words they need are mouths and hands and the gentle pulse of _worshipadorelove_ beating through the bond in his head.

* * *

**A/N Supplemental:** All translations but Vulcan were completed using Google Translate. I used a random English to Vulcan translator for the Vulcan, so apologies if there are any discrepancies in any of the foreign language parts.


End file.
